...the media never really represents the tuba-playing, soccer-playing, science-loving,
bird-watching girl because she's just not an easy sell.

Monday, July 14, 2008

Back to the Grind

The falls, McCormick's Creek, southern Indiana.

This is where I was. And it's where my mind still is, mostly, when it's not off wandering North Side neighborhoods in Chicago looking for the next bakery with promising cupcakes. I came home to a Tucson that is much greener and damper than when I left, although the big monsoons have yet to fire up overhead since I've been back. Half the flowers in the yard are dead, a bumper crop of weeds is springing up, and green fuzzy stuff that is probably mold but that I'll hopefully call short moss has taken over one of the rock terraces in the back.

My office failed to spontaneously combust during my absence, so today I have to make good on a vague promise to myself that the piles of paper will be plowed under at least once a year.

Politics rage on. Bush is lifting the offshore drilling moratorium, causing Bomb Bomb McCain to clap his hands with glee. The New Yorker has put out a deeply satirical cover this week portraying the Obamas as angry black Muslim terrorists, forgetting that most of the country doesn't (a) recognize satire or (b) know that the proper response is not fuck yeah that's what Rush has been saying for months! And the people who led the fight against Arizona's most recent anti-gay-marriage amendment are admitting that they were only in it for the straight couples who might have been adversely affected, and so aren't really interested this time now that gays are the explicit, exclusive target. Awesome. Thanks for the welcome home, guys!